Clackamas County Sheriff Craig Roberts said he will suspend the policy of detaining suspected undocumented immigrants for deportation at the request of the federal immigration agency.
(Thomas Boyd/The Oregonian)

Clackamas County Sheriff Craig Roberts said his staff will no longer detain foreign-born people booked in the county jail just because the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement requests them to -- at least for the time being.

The practice of complying with these requests to hold someone for up to 48 hours with no arrest warrant or criminal charge backfired on Clackamas County on Friday. A U.S. District Court judge ruled that the county violated a woman’s Fourth Amendment right to due process by doing so.

The county considered the routine requests from ICE to be mandatory. However, ICE said the form letters are simply requests, and the judge agreed.

Maria Miranda-Olivares was held 19 hours after she could have been released, and her family was told not to post bail prior to her court hearing, because the jail officials wouldn’t release her anyway. They were waiting for immigration officers to take her into custody, which the judge said amounts to being taken into custody a second time.

So, Miranda-Olivares spent 16 days in jail total.

The ruling caused Washington and Multnomah county sheriff’s to reconsider their policies, as well. Both counties announced they also will stop holding suspected undocument immigrants for deportation.

A later hearing will determine how much the county owes Miranda-Olivares in damages.